


Morning Table

by jenni3penny



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-28 22:07:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16250741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenni3penny/pseuds/jenni3penny
Summary: Long ago I started plotting out a 'KateLives' alternate storyline, one wherein she ended up hiding out in Stillwater and keeping an eye on Jackson Gibbs. It was meant to be like a sort of WitPro situation. Unfortunately, I never got much farther than the opening. Here it is, though, just a short little scene that I had forgotten about. If any Kibbs writers want to pick up the storyline and run with it then have at it!





	Morning Table

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flootzavut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/gifts).



“Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, Jack.”  
  
She cheerfully pretended to ignore the fact that he looked extraordinarily tired and his plaid patterned shirt was buttoned so awkwardly incorrectly that he had an extra few inches hanging lower on one side. He was paused in the kitchen doorway, slippers on his feet and rubbing his fingers against his forehead. The completely and utterly confused look on his face reminding her, unbidden and like a smack to the face, of his son.  
  
“Gets your batteries charged.” The older Gibbs recovered his surprise with a sniff as he searched around his own kitchen and turned a glance over the freshly brewed coffee. “Ann said that. Used to.”  
  
“Yeah?” Kate stretched into the nearest chair at the table, easing her shoulders back and relaxed into it so that he could watch her warily as he stepped toward the opposite chair. “She had a point. So eat that before it gets cold.”  
  
He was looking at her with a strong scrutiny, one that he'd managed to pass on to the next generation and probably without even realizing it. “Why you here, Jo?”

“You really need to lock your front door.” She hushed up with a slightly guilty smile, knowing he never would, knowing his son _never_ would.

Once a Gibbs, always a Gibbs it seemed.

A lot of things about Jackson Gibbs were, ultimately, perfectly familiar (no doubt why she couldn't help spending so much time checking in on him).

A gruff noise of disbelief chuffed off him as he shifted in his chair, arching a brow at her. “Joanna?”

“I need some supplies.” She shrugged into the dubious and cagey way he'd asked it, reaching over to shove his warm plate of eggs and toast closer to him. “Couldn't sleep last night. Figured I'd roust your aged butt outta bed, old man. Store isn't gonna open itself.”

“Listen here, little minxy...”

She grinned indulgently into the playfully accusatory way he was pointing at her, “What? Tell me.”

“You...” He shook his head with a sigh and reached for the coffee she'd set to the table.

“I what?”

His relaxing smile was affectionately delicate, brittle and soft in its sincerity “You _really_ need to meet my son. He'd like your sass.”

_He already does... did. Once. He did like my sass, I think._

_And, God, I really, really, miss your son. Even the more... assholic parts of him._

“You keep saying that.” Kate murmured, feeling a lonely sadness lump in her throat before she thinned him a mischievous smirk. “But you never bring him here for me to appropriately peruse.”

She hadn't perused his son in... years – not that he knew that. Unless, of course, she counted the aged and finger worn photos Jack tended to thrust in her direction whenever he was feeling overtly fatherly and nosy about her personal and/or sexual (or, lately, non-sexual) life. Whenever she taunted and teased with him and he looked at her like something ultimately familiar and familial. Whenever he affectionately grazed those bright sweet blues over her and played at pretending she was something of a daughter-like creature.

Seeing photos of a young Leroy Jethro Gibbs, while knowing she no longer had the ability to connect with the modern version had, every time, choked her throat tight.

He'd seemed to notice it too... stopped showing her photos, but there was no end to trying to match-make.

“Not takin' my word for it, huh?” He grinned at her and the brightness of his too similar blue eyes haunted on her.

Kate recovered with a widened smile and a pert shake of her head, wagging a finger at him over the small table. “You're too good a salesman. Don't believe a word of it. Eat your eggs.”

“I could kidnap you, drive you down to DC with the shotgun.” He sipped at his coffee as she pushed up from the table, his other veined and aged hand reaching for the paper she'd been fiddling her fingers again. “Force him to marry you.”

“From what you've told me,” Kate tugged on his sleeve a couple times before waving toward his plate in another unspoken order, “marriage isn't one of his many talents. Eggs. Now, sir.”

She turned away from the mental repetition of every taunt she'd ever turned in Gibbs' direction regarding his multiple wives, especially knowing she'd have to pass the photo of the dead one (the one he'd _never_ told her about) on her way out of the house.

“You fix that back step yet or do I need to call one of the Bronson boys over here?” She did what she could to keep her voice upbeat and cheery as she passed the row of photos in the main hall, intentionally keeping her eyes from the way Jethro Gibbs repeatedly stared her down in a silent and unrealized accusation. “Stop lookin' at my butt, Jackson Gibbs.”

“Stop turnin' around in front of me then.”


End file.
